Blender is an amazing piece of software; it's history goes back 20 years. I never worked with 3D before and was scared away by all of the claims that Blender was too difficult. However, recent versions (2.6 and 2.7) have a completely revamped interface that is much easier to understand. It's also skinnable and scriptable with Python.

There are so many great Blender tutorials on Youtube and Lynda.com has an excellent Blender essential training course.